


Taking the Bait

by chaineddove



Category: Hikaru no Go
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-05
Updated: 2012-03-05
Packaged: 2017-11-01 04:36:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,238
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/352003
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chaineddove/pseuds/chaineddove
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Yeong-ha comments on Yashiro’s suit. Yashiro takes the bait.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Taking the Bait

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Crossing Boundaries](https://archiveofourown.org/works/325476) by [aiwritingfic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/aiwritingfic/pseuds/aiwritingfic), [chaineddove](https://archiveofourown.org/users/chaineddove/pseuds/chaineddove). 



> Prompts: Sunday brunch, lost in translation, _da capo al fine_. 
> 
> Please forgive the comparative lameness of this fic overall and the incredible lameness of my use of the last theme... music geek peeking through: in the second repetition of the A section of a _da capo_ aria, you always get the same basic theme with more goodies – trills, runs and various other embellishments. In this version? Well, as Yang Hai points out, at least you get alcohol. Incidentally, this is sort of meant to be set during the Samsung Cup mentioned in the Correspondence chapter of Crossing Boundaries. 
> 
> Randomly, did you know the winner of the 1996 Samsung Cup was a Japanese man with the amazing first name of **Yoda**? COINCIDENCE? I THINK NOT.

“Whose unbelievably stupid idea was this, exactly?” Kiyoharu asks, fidgeting in his suit, which is getting uncomfortably tight. He really needs a new one, but he’s going to have to win some games, first, because this trip to Korea wasn’t free, and it’s not like his parents are about to help out. Not that he’d ask them to.

Shindou sighs and says, “Who do you think?” and Touya nudges him in the ribs and says, “Kurata-san was only being thoughtful, Shindou.”

“No he wasn’t,” Shindou argues. “He was just _hungry_.” Kurata 8-dan is seated at the head of the table with a heaping serving of just about everything the buffet offers, so Kiyoharu sees Shindou’s point.

“‘In the interest of international cooperation,’ my ass,” Shindou grumbles. “He just wanted to stuff his face on someone else’s budget.”

“Don’t be bitter just because you lost yesterday and fell out of the tournament, Shindou.” Hong Su-yeong’s smirk is triumphant from across the table.

Shindou scowls. “I really don’t have to listen to this,” he announces. “I can beat you any day.”

Ko Yeong-ha says something in mellifluous Korean. Hong snorts.

"What!?” Shindou demands, immediately up in arms.

“He said it, I didn’t,” Hong points out.

“Said _what?_ ” Shindou demands.

Before Hong can make good on the malicious glint in his eyes and say something really outrageous, Touya translates calmly: “He said, apparently not yesterday. Eat your eggs, Shindou.”

“Touya! My honor is totally being insulted!”

“Ignore him,” Kiyoharu suggests and applies himself to his own food, because he might as well eat since it’s being offered. He’s had a lot of practice lately in ignoring the Korean player – or trying to – and while it doesn’t always work, he’ll never let it be said that he isn’t giving it his best effort.

There’s a low laugh and another stream of incomprehensible Korean. Kiyoharu twitches and cuts his food into unnecessarily tiny pieces. There is silence for a few moments. “Wow,” Hong says. “I’m not translating that.”

Kiyoharu looks up, and sure enough, the bastard is looking directly at him, wearing an expression that is wholly inappropriate and serves to really piss him off. He can’t help asking: “Fine. What?”

Hong spreads his hands in feigned helplessness. Kiyoharu turns his eyes to Touya, who sighs. “He says you are proof that it isn’t an easy thing to do,” he says primly. “Please don’t make a scene.”

Kiyoharu feels the rage bubbling up. “I haven’t even _started_ making a scene yet,” he growls.

“Don’t,” Touya suggests, even as Shindou exclaims, “See, and now he’s totally insulting our friend! Are you going to take that!?”

“Yes,” Touya replies with icy calm.

From down the table, the Chinese player who seems to speak about a dozen languages asks, “Aren’t you going to translate the part about his suit?” He is grinning.

Kiyoharu knows it’s bait, but he can’t help demanding, “What _about_ my suit?”

Touya is looking a bit pink. “Nothing. It’s… small.”

The Chinese player pipes in again with, “You must not have understood the part where he indicated it might look better-”

Before he can finish his sentence and before Kiyoharu can climb over the table to strangle the smirking Koreans, both of them, Touya grabs him by the collar of his uncomfortably tight jacket and hauls him out of the restaurant in a way that suggests he’s had a lot of practice doing it, probably to Shindou – who has apparently decided to be amused as he follows them outside.

“He won’t let you go unless you promise not to kill anyone,” Shindou tells him. “Trust me.”

“Let me go,” Kiyoharu demands.

“You can’t go back in there and kill him,” Touya tells him.

“I told you so,” Shindou says, leaning nonchalantly against the wall.

“I’m not going to kill him,” Kiyoharu says through gritted teeth. _Yet_ , he wants to add, but doesn’t. He decides he can totally live on instant ramen for a few weeks – Shindou does it all the time, right? – and says, “He’s not worth my time. I just need to go buy a new suit.”

“Not worth your time, of course,” Touya says as Shindou smothers laughter.

" _Because I just happen to need a new suit,_ ” Kiyoharu insists.

***

The new suit which cost him a small fortune is little loose, but at least he’ll get some wear out of it this way. Ko is still a handful of centimeters taller, so Kiyoharu is completely okay with the idea that he can’t stop growing. He anticipates towering over the bastard someday and really looks forward to looking down on him. It’ll happen. Eventually.

Ko’s height is especially galling considering he’s being honored at the awards banquet for managing to break into the finals before losing narrowly to an older Korean man with a hard face. Kiyoharu scowls through the entire ceremony, none of which he understands, and stalks off towards the banquet hall as soon as he can, hoping to find a corner in which he can eat without being disturbed before escaping to his hotel for his final night in Korea.

Unfortunately, he is clearly just not that lucky, because someone’s hand grips his shoulder tightly and he has no choice but to stop. He turns and wonders just how Ko managed to get off that stage so fast and track him down in the milling crowd. “Don’t touch me,” he says, his voice almost not a growl. He congratulates himself for his restraint, and also for the fact that he is managing to keep from twitching at the way the Korean pro is looking at him.

Ko says something in Korean and Kiyoharu sighs loudly and says with great irritation, “You realize that _I don’t understand what you’re saying._ Also, you can’t possibly have a problem with _this_ suit.” It cost him three weeks of grocery money, after all; it’s completely presentable and suitably expensive. The fact that Ko’s suit looks twice as expensive only serves to make Kiyoharu more irate. Ko only smiles.

“Actually, he says this one is much more suitable.”

Kiyoharu transfers his glare to Hong. “You do know that you’re actually not helping at all,” he says. “And where did you come from, anyway!”

“Hey, it isn’t my choice,” Hong says. “I owe him a favor.” But he grins, indicating he’s enjoying doing it. “Don’t you want to know what else he said?”

Yes. “No,” Kiyoharu says firmly. “I don’t care.”

Hong, nonplussed, tells him anyway. “He says he thinks he might miss the other one. And also…” Hong trails off.

“I just said,” Kiyoharu reminds him, “I. Don’t. Care.”

The Chinese player from last week’s brunch stops to watch them with an amused expression on his face and a drink in his hand. He toasts them with it and helpfully offers: “Are you embarrassed? There’s no need to be, you know! Let me help. He said that this one would also look better on the fl-”

Before Kiyoharu quite knows what is happening, he is once again being dragged out of the room – he can’t even tell by whom – despite all of his efforts to get loose and strangle Ko with his own silk tie.

“There they go again,” someone he doesn’t even know says, clearly amused as Kiyoharu is dragged past. “Entertainment to go with dinner.”

“And alcohol, which improves it,” the Chinese player comments, watching them go, then downs his glass.


End file.
